World Autism Awareness Day

Today marks the beginning of World Autism Month, coming hot on the heels of Neurodivergent Celebration Week. I only know about Neurodivergent Celebration Week because of a post that appeared in my feed by Eve Redhead , who wrote a blog about what her lived experience of being neurodivergent brings to her work on climate change. So then I checked out the Neurodiversity Celebration Week website and saw all the amazing events I had missed. Still, as the parent of a child recently diagnosed with autism, I am glad to have discovered this wealth of information.

I was thinking a lot about neurodivergence last week because I spent a significant chunk of it assessing P7 children as part of the EDT (The Engineering Development Trust) FunSTEM challenge. My own son is about the same age (11 years old), and it got me thinking - how would he have approached this task? Answer - he would've opted out completely. That's what he did last year when his class were doing their Enterprise Week project. His older sister threw herself into it when she did it and even won a prize for best team player. But my son on the other hand - nope. The real shame is that he is so creative. He would no doubt have a brilliant idea, and be able to come up with inventive ways of presenting it. It would likely be totally original, because his way of seeing the world is different to everyone else's. But we would never know, because in that kind of environment, he would withdraw and refuse to participate. If you didn't know him, or weren't aware of his autism, you would probably think that he was quite a surly child, rude even. When in fact he is kind and affectionate. If you were teaching him, you'd probably think he wasn't listening, or didn't understand your instructions, when in reality he absolutely would know exactly what was expected of him, but would be completely unable to communicate this.

My son is what is referred to as "high functioning". That's not an official diagnosis, it's the terms we use for autistic people who are able to get by in life with little additional support - or who pass as what society considers to be "normal". We are very lucky that he has a diagnosis, although we had to wait four years to get it (thanks COVID). Even now, many children who need a referral to Neurodevelopmental Services will not get one, and lots of people will have reached adulthood without anyone ever even suggesting that their struggles may be as a result of being neurodivergent. The reason I believe that this is so important is that it helps people to understand that there is nothing wrong with them, nothing that requires to be "fixed". Their autism is simply part of who they are. It's the rest of us who need to change our outlook.

Parenting an neurodivergent child is making me question and challenge a lot of my own preconceptions and assumptions, particularly in the workplace. How much potential are we missing through not fully facilitating the participation of people in the workplace? Particularly ones likely to bring unique perspectives to problem solving. As I continue on my own journey of learning and awareness, I promise that I will take the lessons my son teaches me and bring them to work as a supporter, ally and advocate for neurodivergent people.

The image above is a Full Adder Circuit that he built from scratch in Minecraft (no, me either!).